Late Sunday PM December 18th Update – Staying Quiet to Start A New Week

Good late Sunday evening, everyone. Nick back in the weather center with your updated blog for tonight. All I can say is thank goodness that our last storm system is out of here! It started as freezing drizzle on Friday when I was home around the St. Louis area. We were anticipating temperatures to go above freezing during the afternoon, but it didn’t happen. The freezing drizzle just made an absolute mess on the roads and left me stuck on the road Friday evening (not to mention probably thousands of other people during rush hour). Thankfully, a nice couple that lives not too far from my mom were letting people in for shelter, food, water and rest and they were kind to let me in for the night! I was able to make it back to my mom’s house Saturday morning before the drizzle and snow worked back in.

That system made a mess of things all over the region. Some people I knew were going to Mizzou to see some of their kids graduate, but they couldn’t get to Columbia and had to turn right back around. I heard from Doug that the roads were just awful down here, too. Not only did this system leave us with almost a buffet of precipitation, it did a number on our temperatures. Have a look at Joplin’s temperatures from Saturday morning to this afternoon…

Going from early morning highs in the middle 50s all the way down to 3° in just 24 hours! It may look like our coldest point Sunday morning was -2°, but Joplin’s low was -4°! Not only does that beat the old record low of 1° back in 1964, but that’s the first time since January 6th and 7th of 2014 that overnight lows dropped below 0°. I remember both those days very well with lows ranging between -10° and 0°. This system meant business. It brought freezing drizzle as Saturday morning got underway, then we finally switched over to snow as colder air aloft worked in Saturday evening. Snow amounts ranged between 1 to 2 inches in general with Doug picking up 1.5″ around his neck of the woods. Saturday’s snow meant that compared to last winter, we already saw about 75% of what we got last winter overall (last season’s 2″ of snow). Thankfully, we’re quiet tonight on the radar below…

While high pressure over Missouri keeps us cold again tonight, that keeps the skies quiet. Once the high scoots off to the east, the southerly wind returns and that will kick-start a little warming trend…

Thanks to clear skies, the light breeze and some snow still on the ground, it’ll be cold again to start your Monday morning with lows around -1°. Once we see the south wind kick in under mostly sunny skies, I expect highs to top out near 30°. It’ll still be cold, but it’s a step in the right direction!

We should fare much better on Tuesday. After starting in the middle teens Tuesday morning, we should climb into the lower 40s under mostly sunny skies…

We stay quiet from Wednesday through Friday with highs bouncing between the middle 40s and about 50°. Our next system to watch wants to come in here just in time for the Christmas weekend. Here’s how the 18Z GFS wants 6 AM Christmas Day to look like…

So far, we could see rain chances during the afternoon and evening on Christmas Eve. With the way the system wants to track, this could stay as rain as we work through Christmas Day before we get cold going into that following Monday. We have time to watch this system, though, because some computer models want the system to track south (meaning rain and snow for us). Before we deal with another weekend system, we’ll keep things quiet around here for the short term!

Have a good night and a great Monday!

Nick

LONG RANGE FORECAST IS BELOW BASED OFF THE HEADY PATTERN:

Here is your 7-day forecast:

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LONG RANGE FORECAST:Based off of the HP(Heady Pattern)

SLIGHT CHANCES: MEAN IT IS A WEAKER SYSTEM THAT WILL GIVE US SCATTERED SHOWERS OR SNOW SHOWERS.

IF I DON’T SAY SLIGHT: THAT MEANS THIS IS A STRONGER SYSTEM

December 26th-New Years Eve: A mild start to the week with rain and snow chances on Tuesday and Wednesday. Cold and dry the rest of the week.

January 1st-8th: A mild start to the week with slight chances for rain on Monday. Then cold temperatures work in with slight chances for snow by Saturday.